


Yellow Chrysanthemums

by BadFicOnly (truthinadvertising)



Series: Goretober [8]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Blood and Gore, Character Death, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 19:02:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29212359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/truthinadvertising/pseuds/BadFicOnly
Summary: Tooru is happy, he's married for God's sake. Hajime can't force his feelings on him. And he'll pay for it.Goretober Prompt: Hanahaki
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru, Oikawa Tooru/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Goretober [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2144754
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17





	Yellow Chrysanthemums

"No one is going to find me." Hajime thought as he lay in his bed in his small apartment. "I'm going to die and no one is going to find me until they start to smell me." 

His breath was ragged, wheezing into his lungs and around the roots that had grown in them. His sheets were blood-stained but he didn't have the wherewithal to get up and change them. All around him, by his head, on the floor, where half bloomed flowers and petals. 

Hajime hadn't told anyone about his condition. He'd taken a long time to be truthful with himself about the issue, to begin with. When he'd at long last been unable to lie to himself anymore he'd decided it just wasn't fair to Tooru to tell him. 

Tooru and his wife Hoshiko were happy. They were expecting a little boy. Tooru was so excited to be a dad. Hajime couldn't ruin that for him. Just, out of the blue, go up to him with "Hey, by the way, I love you and I'm gonna die because of it, just letting you know." 

Hajime rolled over on his side and wretched over the bed. His airway closed up and his lungs seized as he felt the flower come up his windpipe. He felt the grip of the roots in his lungs and bronchi tighten and he choked. Red splashed from his mouth as his trachea filled with flora and blood. He hacked wetly as the flower bloomed in his mouth, he still felt the stem down his throat. He reached into his mouth, supporting himself on his other elbow, and grabbed the head of the flower, pulling the whole thing, stem and all, from his body as he convulsed around it. 

Weakly, he dropped the fully realized flower onto the floor. Full blooms, not long now. Weakly he collapsed back onto his bloody pillow, small coughs escaping him as he dropped back onto his bloody, phlegmy, pillow. 

Tears formed in his eyes even though he struggled not to cry, it would only make things more miserable. But he couldn't help himself, he sobbed and hacked more flower petals all over the bed. 

He was never going to see Tooru again. Hell, he was never going to see anyone again! At this rate, he would be dead before morning. He wasn't even sure he could talk so it wasn't like he could call someone to come over. And then what would he do? How would he explain all this? No, being alone was better for everyone. But it didn't stop him from crying. 

He couldn't stop thinking about Tooru, and every time he did he felt the thorns of this damn plant pierce his lungs a little deeper. He was afraid one or both of them were going to collapse. But that didn't stop his best friend's face from haunting him as he lay there, awaiting his death. 

Hours went by. Hajime was covered in blood and bile was he was too weak to clean himself up. The sun had set and he lay in the dark vomiting up blooming flowers and blood clots. He could barely breathe at all. It felt like there wasn't any room left in his lungs for air. He was suffocating to death. He wished he could just fall unconscious and be done with it but his body wouldn't let him. It was like it was waiting for something. 

Finally, he couldn't take it anymore. He had been up all night drowning in petals. The sun was just barely peaking in through the curtains. Tooru always got up about now for a run. He had too, he just couldn't do it. Pushing himself up with fluttering muscles he threw his arm out to his bedside table and patted around looking for his phone. When it found it, after another coughing fit producing a fully mature flower, he pulled it to his weary eyes and, shaking, he pushed Tooru's speed dial button. 

It rang a few times and Hajime was terrified that he might not pick up. But after a couple rings, it picked up. 

"Hey Iwa-chan, what's up?" Tooru panted into the phone. Hajime was right, he must have been running. He tried to speak, to tell him everything, but he couldn't, the branches of the plant had made their way into his larynx. 

"Iwa-chan? Helloooo? You there?" 

Just hearing Tooru's voice made his heart flutter. And that made the flowers start coming up again. He started coughing. 

"Iwa-chan, I can hear you, you dumbass, did you butt dial me?" 

_ Tooru... _ he wanted to call out but the plant wouldn't let him. He was wracked with sobs and choking coughs. He couldn't get any air in, he could physically feel the flower making it's way up his throat. It felt huge. He couldn't breathe around it at all. His vision started to fade. 

"Iwa-chan?! Are you ok? Hajime, talk to me!" 

I love you... he wanted to say. But he couldn't. All he could do was hack, and wrack, and sob. Tooru was screaming at him on the other end of the line. This isn't what he had wanted. But his brain was fading out fast with the lack of oxygen. He knew this was it. 

"Hajime, hold on, I'm calling an ambulance, I'll be right over!" 

No, don't come... he tried but he could barely even think the words. At least the last thing he would hear would be Tooru's voice, panicked as it was. 

"HAJIME!" was the last thing he heard, adoringly through clouded ears, before he felt the bouquet of flowers shoot from his mouth, his lungs give out, and he finally slipped into unconsciousness, never to wake up again. 

******

Tooru sprinted to Hajime's place, on the phone with 119 quickly calling emergency services. Hajime didn't live far from Tooru but he lived in the opposite direction of where he normally did his morning run. Still, he beat the paramedics there, taking the stairs 2 a time to Hajime's third-story apartment. 

"Hajime!?" Tooru yelled as he banged on the door. Maybe it was just some fit and Iwa-chan was fine now. He was healthy as a horse, he always took good care of himself, Tooru couldn't imagine what was wrong with him. 

When Hajime didn't come to the door after a few seconds Tooru was already digging his keys out of his bag. They both had keys to each other's places. Hajime house sat often enough while Tooru and Hoshiko were at away games and Tooru had insisted on one for Iwa-chan's place "just in case". He was glad he had insisted now. 

Tooru let himself in just as he heard the siren of the ambulance turn into the parking lot. The apartment wasn't big, just a one-bedroom, so he didn't have to look long to find Hajime's body. 

Tooru stood in shock in the doorway to Hajime's bedroom, unable to move toward him or away from him. Hajime's bare chest was covered in blood spatter, just like his bed and pillow, even the floor. And there were flowers everywhere, yellow chrysanthemums. The worst part was the spray of 8 fully bloomed chrysanthemums sprouting out of Hajime's mouth. The vibrant yellow in stark contrast to his blue-tinged skin. 

The paramedics came rushing in. One took Tooru aside as the other two ran in to help Hajime. Tooru knew the paramedic was talking to him but he couldn't hear her through the blood rushing in his ears. He knew what death by flowers meant. Unrequited love. 

And as much as he tried to tell himself 8 was a random number it had nothing to do with the fact that that was his jersey number. It could have been any flower, it didn't matter that in high school he and Hajime took a "What Kind of Flower Are You" quiz because they lost a bet with Makki and Mattsun and he had gotten yellow chrysanthemums which meant royalty and Iwa-chan had mercilessly teased him about it. It didn't mean anything that Tooru was the person who Hajime had called in his death throws, he was his best friend. 

But as the paramedic pushed him into a chair and covered him with a blanket, saying something about going into shock, Tooru knew none of that was true. He knew he was the cause of Hajime's death. And he knew there was nothing he could have done to prevent it. He lifted his heavy head and looked into the bedroom at those bloodstained yellow chrysanthemums broken under the feet of the paramedics, trying to help a man who was beyond help. He started to cry as he wondered how long Hajime had kept this secret. 

He buried his face in the blanket the paramedic had wrapped him in, letting the shock and horror and loss bleed out through his tear ducts. His throat was scratchy and he choked as he cried. As he hacked into the blanket he felt something in his throat, he coughed whatever it was into his hand and stared. 

A single red spider lily. The final goodbye. 

Tooru cried harder. 


End file.
